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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25003081">Protector</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/boy_with_the_glasses/pseuds/boy_with_the_glasses'>boy_with_the_glasses</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Persona 5</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Fix-It, M/M, also P5 protag in P5R, carrot Joker is here, kind of, posession, so is your usual Joker, toying with time</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>In-Progress</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 04:40:38</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,696</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25003081</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/boy_with_the_glasses/pseuds/boy_with_the_glasses</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>There is one boy, one Joker, and one Shadow. One wants to get through his probation, the other wants to fix the past. The third is there to be a nuisance and remind the other two they are both idiots.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Akechi Goro/Kurusu Akira</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>6</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>23</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Protector</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I have hardly any idea where this is going.<br/>This was all inspired by one cursed but beautiful <a href="https://imgur.com/2HoTQZH">art</a> and carrot Joker.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Ah, would you look at that, he is completely spent!”</p><p></p><div>
  <p>A grabby hand aims to poke and prob at the beaten black and blue boy cuffed to the metal chair. It gets swatted away angrily, and a dagger is shoved in the offender’s face in a clear warning. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>“Boo-hoo, aren’t we angry.” The black figure sneakers, its bright hair contrasting ridiculously with the dim greyed room. Nonetheless, it retreats, hands showed in its pockets. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joker doesn’t lower his dagger. His other arm is curled protectively around the cuffed boy, red eyes steady and unwavering behind the mask. There is also buried cold fury, its heat threatening to consume anyone who would walk through the thick steel door of the interrogation room. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joker’s bright-haired double stays relaxed near it, and while he seems much more easygoing and unassuming, it isn’t hard to see the overwhelming wish to harm and break in the curl of his mouth, malice outed in the somehow jerky movement of fingers. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Ne-ne, what would you do when he enters?" The double taunts, grin predatory wide. The exact dagger's copy is juggled mockingly in his misleadingly lax grip. "Would you bash his skull? Would you burn him? Stab him? Strangle him?" He giggles, sounding hollow and uncaring. Suddenly, he narrows his eyes and enormous hunger fills them to the brim. "Or are you gonna let me play with him? Ne? What would it be, <em>partner</em>?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"You will not harm him." Joker calmly recites, as if partaking the old worn-out argument. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Why? Because fleshbag cares for him?" The double mocks, twitchy fingers drum on the table a familiar melody from a bar filled with warm memories. The cuffed boy stirs in his unease. Joker gently presses the palm to boy's forehead, combs through his messy hair, whispers soothing little things in his ear.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>The drumming stops. The double's features almost twist in something unsavory before wicked grin overcomes them instead.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Awww, how adorable. Touchy fella, our landlord, ain't he."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Stop provoking him. He needs rest."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"As if rest helps him." Ginger-headed twin sneakers. "A real something, his friends. Let him be caught, let him be beaten, let him be the sacrificial lamb. He could have been killed even before that woman walked in."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joker stays grim and silent.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"We could have slaughtered them all, back then." The double continues, leaning in to make his point. His gaze is blood-lusted, pupil blown as if drunk. His voice almost sounds feverish, and Joker is visibly affected by it, by the words that follow. "Who do they think they are, barging into <em>our</em> reality as if they belong? Taking <em>our</em> thief? Don't tell me you didn't want to teach them a lesson. I felt it. I <em>felt</em> your hands shaking when you were holding me back when you did not let me get out and give them <em>hell</em>."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>The twin brings his hand closer, cupping boy's cheek, lovingly stroking it. Joker hasn't stopped him this time.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Look at him now. Beaten and bloody. Locked up and alone. Almost broken. When will he break? When the traitor opens the door and puts a gun to his head? Oh, or maybe he won't. Maybe he accepts that his merry band of friends fucked it up. Maybe he realizes it isn't a dream or a nightmare, but a reality where he was dragged into Metaverse alongside the pretty detective and surrenders?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>His hand trails up and up, finally cupping Joker's very face in an offendedly affectionate gesture. "Or it is your heart that is going to be broken, eh, Joker? Unlike our little thief here, you seemed to love the treacherous bastard. I wonder why is that, when I still don't feel anything for those meat sacks our thief calls friends."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joker growls at him, and the double laughs. He swirls on his feet, grand sweeping wave of his hand taking in the stingy room. In the corners, red otherworldly haze lingers. There was a presence, once, when the boy was thrown into the room, when he was yet to be spirited onto the other side, but that presence was eliminated as soon as it has made itself known, two profound gunshots ending its miserable attempt to leech at the thief's suffering. Now, there are no spectators to the doubles' antics. One cognitive presence seems to linger outside the doors, but perhaps its instincts are sharp enough to stay away, to not show more mind-power than it should, or otherwise, it would end up its short-termed existence sooner rather than later.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"How low the loyal guard dogs have fallen! He never let us out, anyway. Never heard us. And you!" The double jabbed a finger into Joker's face. "You were such a spoilsport! Always ruining it for me. <em>You can't shove him back and take control. Leave him alone. Stand down.</em> Look where it led him! Look where it led us. It wouldn't have been an issue if you just let me do how I please at least <em>once</em>."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joker doesn't strike when the double presses close into his personal space in one boneless lunge, but his dagger finds doppelganger's neck. It draws blood, yet the yellow-eyed reflection just grins like a madman. "Hey, Joker, what will you do? He's gonna enter that door, ya know. And our little thief right here is all flesh and bones, <em>very real</em> package. His lovely friends didn't count on us dragging him in. A bunch of <em>idiots.</em> Hey-hey, if you don't want me kill <em>him</em>, may I kill <em>them</em>? That's their fault too, if you ask me."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>A bit passes.</p>
  <p>"Scary!" Sweetly sing-songs the double, backing away and not bothering to wipe out the blood ticking down his neck. He still grins unpleasantly, the fingers drumming on the table again. He repeats the melody they constantly heard here and there, and the grin only widens when Joker's eyes become glassed for a mere second.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Stop it." Joker cuts him, catching his wrist. The boy in his grip doesn't stir. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Tell me then." And the twin is alarmingly close again, this time catching and twisting Joker's hand away. And where Joker is fast, his double is strong. He applies just a tiny bit more of his strength, and the dagger clatters on the ground. "Why would I listen to you when our pretty landlord is about to perish? Why would I spare anyone anymore? The fleshbags he calls friends, who are nowhere to be seen. Or the man he was earnestly calling his rival, who is about to put a bullet in his head."</p>
  <p>The hand that is as before curled protectively around the unconscious boy tightens up minutely. Then, it lets go. The double lifts his brows bemusedly. He releases his steel grip. Joker shrugs him off, steps away from the cuffed boy. Absentmindedly, he rubs his abused wrist.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>The twin's eyes narrow. "Is it permission?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>The dagger on the ground flashes in blue. The searing flame brings in back into Joker's grip.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Or a half-ass challenge?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joker levels the double with a measuring look. It does nothing but gives the twin's grin a bloodthirstily edge. Then Joker looks past him, at as of now closed door which is soon bound to open by the person he is obsessed with so much that even the death hasn't stopped his longing.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joker meets his twisted image's gaze head-on.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"You know," the reflection calmly notes, deathly serious and collected, theatrics forgotten, "my name doesn't suit you at all, <em>Joker</em>."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Then <em>it</em> smiles, something remotely warm and sweet, but best described as condescending. </p>
</div><div>
  <p>It speaks, and the door behind creaks open.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"<em>Why don't you try again?</em>"</p>
</div><hr/><p>"You are a walking phenomenon."</p><p></p><div>
  <p>The double on the bar stool is grinning again. His inhuman ginger hair burns with fire under the rays of the rising sun shining through the window.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Look who is talking~" He taunts in response, grin morphing into a lazy smile as he lays uncaring at the counter. "Checked our little treasure, did you?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joker hums, the frown easing. He walks behind the bar.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Pour me a cup, be nice."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"He will be punished if I use the tools."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"We can easily take care of the old man."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"We won't."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>A pause, then...</p>
  <p>"Going to sit it out again?" A dagger almost makes a dent in the wood, the tip stopping barely an inch from the surface. Joker's own dagger intercepting the swing just in time. "I'll kill you, if so. I won't let you spoil my fun anew, <em>stowaway</em>."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joker doesn't appreciate the implication even though he can't argue with it.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Funny to hear it from a Shadow."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>The double leans closer.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"But I am <em>his</em> Shadow. You, on the other hand, is an overpriced extra. So why don't you scram?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"I won't leave you alone with him."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>The grin becomes outright sickening.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"He would have been better with me alone."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"So then why did you drag me back with you?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>The reflection is dead silent. His silence makes Joker anxious, hits on the already stretched nerves.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"'Cuz I want him alive." It says simply. "If <em>he</em> lives, <em>I</em> live. You keep him alive and healthy, I have no complaints. You let me go out and play, I have no complaints."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>And on the words, it is simple enough.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"But." And much faster than Joker can react, much faster than his reflexes can catch up, the Shadow's hands are on his neck and squeezing. Yellow eyes stare hatedly from behind a matching white and black mask. "Just you try sitting at the back again, comforting yourself with a useless tale that your meddling will ruin everything. I <em>will</em> end you then. I'll kill you, and he'll be exclusively my plaything. Alive and pretty, and won't needing anyone besides me."</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Then the double releases his grip, and it isn't a grin stretching his lips anymore. It is a smile, frighteningly similar to the one of the famous detective prince.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>Joker is not sure what to do with himself when he is more sad than he is afraid or disgusted.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"Do we have a deal, <em>Joker</em>?"</p>
</div><div>
  <p>What a mockery his name has truly become.</p>
</div><div>
  <p>"We do, <em>Shadow</em>."</p>
</div>
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